Goodbyes
by Hay Brady
Summary: After Rae's murder, Brendan needs to get away from the village for while due to all the villagers accusing him. But before he can go, Ste goes to see him with something important to say.


A/N - **I'm basically writing the total opposite to what is in the show at the minute. I don't think the angst is doing me any good!  
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"Brendan!" Ste shouted, banging his fist on the front door of Brendan's flat. "Let me in!"

Ste knew he was in there. Where else would he be at this time? He got Brendan's number up on his phone, and pressed ring. Holding his mobile to his ear.

"Come on." He muttered to himself. "Answer."

'_Hi, it's Brendan Brady. Leave a message and I'll get back to you_.'

"Fuck." Ste cursed as he snapped his phone shut. He put it back in his pocket and continued banging on the door. Brendan had no right to ignore him. Ste didn't care what his excuse was. He kept pounding his fist against the door. It had gone numb now. The pain had disappeared. He was just focussed on speaking to Brendan. He had too.

It hadn't been easy, the last few months for them. After everything that happened while Declan was around, Ste had to call it a day on their .. 'relationship', if you could even call it that. He didn't need the grief anymore. Being involved with someone like Brendan, it emotionally exhausted you. Every day was an uphill battle that Ste was always sure he would lose. They were a lost cause when together. One thing went right, a hundred went wrong. That's normally what happened. And this time was no different. Brendan's fists, once again, came into play. This time, however, it knocked some sense into him. He realised that Brendan would never be ready for anything he wanted. He couldn't do it. He swore to Brendan that it would be the last time he touched him. In any way. Because he was done. And he meant it, too. He wasn't going back there again. He couldn't believe he had been so stupid in the first place to fall for Brendan's empty words. Promises of changing, promises of honesty and openness. How could he let himself fall for that? From a person like Brendan? Someone who couldn't even say the word 'gay' without almost choking to death. Not anymore, though. That was it. No more stupidity from Ste. New slate. New life. Even a new-ish appearance, too. He felt like a different person once he came back off his holidays. More .. confident with himself. And it showed too, in conversations with Brendan. He didn't let himself get too close. He had spent two weeks in the sun building up solid defenses. Ones that were Brendan-proof. Or at least he hoped were. He didn't plan on letting them crumble so soon.

Brendan tried a few times to worm his way back in. It seemed Brendan wanted to keep both Ste and Declan in his life, without having to tell Declan anything. He wanted to have his cake, and eat it too. The new confidence Ste came back with, the cockiness, it was all so .. appealing. It reminded Brendan of the first time he met the boy. How he pretty much blackmailed him for a job at the club. Cocky little bastard he was. Bold as brass. So sure of himself. Ste should have known what he was getting himself into back then, when Brendan punched him straight out. But he was intrigued by the boy. By his attitude. He knew there was something about him. Something similar to his own life. Perhaps that was what attracted him to Ste in the first place. The fact he saw some of himself in him. And whatever it was, he wanted to find out. He wanted him. Purely a sexual attraction at first. Brendan only wanted one thing. He didn't expect things to become so serious in the space of a few months. Ste loved him. Brendan knew he did, before Ste even said it. Brendan could tell. The way he looked at him. Such adoration in his eyes, even after everything Brendan had done to him. He had been looked at that way before with the others. That was normally his cue to leave. Pack up, go somewhere else, start afresh, find a new toy to play with. However it proved difficult. He found himself craving the boy more and more each day. Sometimes it felt like his air supply had been cut off until he walked into a room. Brendan didn't have a fucking clue what it was, but he didn't like it. He had never felt that way for anyone before in his life. He had never wanted someone so much. It scared him. The thoughts he sometimes had about Ste, and him, about them together, they frightened him. He was all Brendan thought about. Every morning when he woke up, Ste would be in his head, and every night before he went to bed, Ste would still be there. Even in his dreams. He couldn't escape him. He tried to fool himself. Convince himself that it was nothing more than just fucking. He clung onto the illusion for so long, desperately wanting to believe it. Yet part of him, in the back of his mind, kept eating away at him. Telling him how he really felt about the lad. What he really wanted. It made him sick with himself. Men shouldn't have those types of feelings for each other. It infuriated him that this brown-haired, blue-eyed barman had gotten so far under his skin. Like an itch he just couldn't scratch. An itch he didn't even want to scratch, maybe.

Then things happened. Danny Houston arrived in the village, annoyed by a Mr Warren Fox. He wanted Brendan to see to it. To get rid of him. Brendan laughed it off. He took orders from nobody. However, Danny knew Brendan's weakness. He knew where to hit Brendan where he was sure it would hurt. Firstly, by letting Brendan know that he knew he was gay, and secondly, threatening one thing Brendan really cared about. Ste. Ste's life. That, admittedly, hurt much more than the first. Danny had taken lives before. It could be arranged. Brendan couldn't bare thinking about not having Ste around anymore. Having it on his mind that Ste's life was taken because of his involvement with him. He couldn't have that. He knew what he would have to do to stop it. He needed Warren onside. It wasn't hard. Warren didn't want Danny around as much as Brendan. They formed an alliance of sorts. Planning to get rid of him. But when the night came, Danny began pushing it. Brendan warned him. He gave him a chance. But then he brought Ste up, and Brendan instantly saw red. He crossed a line that he never thought he would. Images of Ste flashing through his mind as he beat the life out of his old business associate. All the pain he had caused him. The broken ribs, the bloodied lips, the bruised eyes. He could hear the sounds of whimpers in his ears. The cries out of pain coming from Ste's mouth. The pleading for Brendan to stop. It all came flooding back. There was no way out now. Brendan was in too deep. Ste. He was .. he was important. He was someone Brendan needed to have around. Never in his life had he needed anyone before he met him. He walked alone until he met the twenty one-year old Mancunian. His world had been turned upside down by this boy. He could barely even remember his life without him in it. All those others Brendan had been with in the past, none of them could make him feel the way Ste did. He drove him crazy with desire. Drove him crazy in general. He was different. Completely different. Possibly even special.

Nothing was ever plain sailing, though. Something always happened to ruin everything. Something that Ste didn't like, or Brendan couldn't cope with. Like Declan arriving. Brendan couldn't deal with the pressure of everything. He was so close to telling Declan, as well. To prove to Ste that he could be honest when it suited him. That he was serious about wanting to change. About wanting to be with him. But when it came to it, he just couldn't form the words. Instead he just babbled on about being a man. He even idiotically managed to insult Ste somewhere along the line, too. He didn't know what had come over him. He just couldn't do it. However someone else did it for him. Someone else, accidentally, blurted out Brendan's little secret. Rae Wilson. Ste couldn't quite believe his ears when he heard Declan's voice from behind them. His stomach flipped. Brendan would go crazy. He would be furious. And he was. He pinned Rae up against a gate, screaming in her face, scaring the life out of her. Ste couldn't do anything to stop it, either. Brendan wouldn't let go when he told him too. He carried on shouting. Threatening her. Ste had never seen him so angry before, and he had seen most sides to Brendan nobody else had. Ste didn't think anything more of their argument after he said bye to Rae. Apologising that he had to look after the kids and couldn't go to her gig. Little did he know that, that goodbye, would be their last. Rae was murdered that night. Ste was devastated. His best friend, murdered. He had no idea who would do such a thing, until he found out Brendan had been in questioning. Then it all made sense. Well at the time it did. He got ahead of himself. Kicking Brendan when he was down. Accusing him. Hating him. Brendan couldn't deal with it. He tried to convince Ste that he wouldn't do anything like that to Rae. He reminded Ste that he didn't hurt women. But Ste was having none of it. He wouldn't listen to a word, and that encounter they had was the last. Ste hid away in his flat. Crying over his best friend. His heart breaking over the man he loved. He didn't know how things had gotten so bad, so quickly. Then a conversation with Amy. A real eye opener, it was. She believed that Brendan was innocent. Ste thought it was madness. She hated Brendan. Why would she believe him? But then she explained to him that Brendan had threatened to hurt her so many times, and never went through with any of it, when he had all the time in the world too. Because all of Brendan's threats were exactly that. Just threats. No real intention behind them but to scare her. She went on to tell him that lashing out in a moment of anger was a lot different to planning and going through with the murder of a young woman, just because she outed him. Not at all condoning what Brendan had done to Ste. She just wanted him to see the difference. And the seriousness of what he believed.

And that's what brought Ste to Brendan's door now. His conversation with Amy. She didn't approve of their relationship, but she didn't want Ste to realise that Brendan was innocent when it was too late. She was the one who sent him round there. But it seemed to be no use. Brendan wasn't answering the door. He wasn't answering Ste's calls, or replying to his texts. Ste had no other ideas. But then it hit him. Why had he wasted his time at the front door, when they had a back door? He shook his head at his own stupidity, and walked around the flat. He turned the handle, and the door opened, simple enough. They never locked this door. Ste knew due to the amount of times he had to sneak out the back near the beginning of their relationship. Ste stood in the kitchen for a minute, relishing in the warmth of the house. After being stood in the pouring rain for almost twenty minutes, he thought he was entitled to warm himself up first before probably being thrown back out. He heard some shuffling from Brendan's bedroom, and some swearing too. He laughed. Definitely Brendan. He found himself moving forwards, toward the bedroom door. Wringing his hands together. Feeling sick with nerves. He wondered what Brendan would say when he saw him. Whether he would say anything. Before he could think, he knocked on the bedroom door, and heard the shuffling of feet stop. He knocked again. Ignoring the throbbing pain in his fist from all the knocking earlier. He braced himself.

The door, after a couple of minutes that felt like forever, did open ever so slightly. Just enough for Brendan to peer out. His eyes widening in shock. He looked exhausted. Like he hadn't slept for days. It hurt Ste to see him in such a way. Such a way you didn't really expect to see someone who could be so cruel in. Ste placed his hand on the door, pushing it open a bit more. Brendan stepped backwards, letting it open. He just stood half way in his bedroom. His eyes never leaving Ste's. He didn't know whether he should be angry that he was here, or relieved to see him. He hated to admit it, but he had missed him. So much. He never answered the door to Brendan when he went round to see him. He didn't speak to him. It had been ages since they last saw each other. Ste looked as bad as Brendan felt. And probably looked, too. The boy had obviously been crying. His eyes red. Still watery.

Ste plucked up enough courage to speak first. "I'm sorry." He whispered, trying to swallow the lump that had already formed in his throat. "I'm really sorry."

Brendan said nothing, instead he stepped forward cautiously. Ste didn't react to the movement. He carried on fiddling with his hands. Pulling at his fingers.

"I never meant .." His words broke off as tears began rolling down his cheeks. "I don't think-"

Ste couldn't even finish his sentence, Brendan had already crushed him in an embrace. His arms encased tightly around him. Face pressing against Ste's neck. Inhaling his familiar scent. Something that was just completely him. Ste didn't quite know where to put his arms as they hung by his sides, so he settled for wrapping them around Brendan's back. Holding onto him just as tight. He could have stayed like that forever. It wasn't often Brendan hugged him. Only a couple of times. When Amy was in the hospital, when he got upset over the fire. That was it. He wasn't a hugging sort of person, really. He didn't know what had come over him, but he just felt like he needed to hold onto him for a while.

Unfortunately they couldn't stay like that forever. Brendan let his arms fall back down to his sides. He looked down at Ste, who's eyes were sparkling in the dim light of the kitchen. He raised a hand, cupping his cheek. Feeling his smooth skin underneath his thumb, as it traced over his cheekbone. He kept it there for a minute, before walking back into his bedroom. Ste followed. Surprised to see a bag on the bed, clothes hanging out of it.

"You're leaving?" Ste asked in disbelief, wiping the remained of tears away from his eyes.

"For a bit." Brendan replied, voice hoarse. "Until the heat dies down."

"Why?" Ste asked, "You don't have to go anywhere."

"I do." Brendan corrected him. Finding it difficult to ignore Ste's obvious heart break.

"Is it cause of me? Because of what I said?"

"No," Brendan laughed once, humorlessly. "Not because of you, no."

"Then why?" Ste approached him, his fingers clinging onto the sleeve of Brendan's shirt.

Brendan dropped the shirt he was attempting to fold onto his bed, and sighed. "I can't stay."

Ste sniffed loudly. "I'll come with you then." He suggested, tugging at Brendan's shirt sleeve desperately now. "I'll go pack some of my stuff, leave Amy a note, we could be gone by tonight."

Brendan turned to face him. Ste's eyes filled with hope. The corners of Brendan's mouth formed themselves into what could pass as a smile at his offer. Going away with Ste. Somewhere private. That could be nice, Brendan thought. Very tempting, too. They had a lot of things to sort out. To talk through. And they even had an excuse to stay in hotel rooms all day. Brendan sighed once more. He shook his head, averting his gaze to avoid seeing Ste's face fall.

"Why?" Ste questioned.

"Because your needed here." Brendan said. "Your kids. They'll miss you."

"And _I'll_ miss _you_." Ste choked out. "The amount of fun the kids have with Lee and Amy, they won't even notice I'm gone."

"I don't know how long I'm going for.." Brendan felt like shouting at himself for how paper thin his excuses were.

Ste let Brendan's shirt sleeve free. "You're not coming back." He mumbled. "That's why I can't come, innit?"

Brendan laughed. "You can't come because you have responsibilities here, Stephen."

"I asked you a question."

"And I heard you." Brendan said, quietly. It was amusing to him, that Stephen thought he could pack up and leave so easily. "I am coming back."

"When?"

"I don't know." He answered honestly.

"What if you decide you don't wanna come back?"

"I will." Brendan was aware his attempts to reassure Ste weren't working. "Trust me."

"Easier said than done."

Brendan zipped up his bag. All ready to go. He turned to face Ste again. So .. beautiful. So innocent. Brendan didn't want to be reminded of the dark weeks without him. What mattered was that he was here now. It's all he wanted. He let one of his arms reach out, a hand placing itself on the back of Ste's neck. "You'll just have to try."

Ste didn't even think before his next move. It was just instinct. Something he needed to go for. And he did. He stood on his tip toes, and placed his own lips softly against Brendan's. He planned on pulling away just after the once, but Brendan had already brought his other hand up to the back of his neck, holding him place. Willing the kiss to carry on. Ste obliged happily, wrapping his arms around Brendan's neck. It wasn't like their other kisses. It wasn't all clashing of tongues and teeth. It was slow. Meaningful. Filled with a different kind of passion. Like taking one last drink. Having one last meal. Something you needed to savour, because you didn't know how long it would be until you had it again. Both reminding each other of what they had. What they still have. And what they'll always probably have. Every single feeling was still there. They had never gone away. It was near damn impossible to move on, for both of them. Ste had tried with Noah, and look how that turned out. Brendan didn't even bother trying. He knew it would be fruitless. Inevitably, Ste and Noah broke up, with help of Brendan, of course, and he took back what belonged to him. This is all Brendan wanted. This is who he wanted. Just him. That's it. That's all.

Both men reluctantly broke away eventually. Breathing heavily and fast. They kept the proximity. Their foreheads pressed together as they tried to compose themselves. They had been here too many times before. Having to basically end before they even started. It was like history repeating itself. A constant feeling of deja vu. It just couldn't be helped this time, though. Brendan couldn't stick around while everyone silently judged him. Silently accused him of killing those poor girls. He hated people talking about him anyway, but being labelled as a murderer, he didn't like it. And he didn't want to stick around to listen to it. He figured by the time he got back, everyone would have moved on from it. Talking about the real killer maybe, if the police did their jobs properly.

"I need you to do something for me." Brendan whispered, breaking the comfortable silence.

"What?" Ste looked up at him. His eyes shining, expressing every emotion he was feeling at this very moment.

"Keep an eye on Cheryl."

"Why?"

"Well," Brendan spoke. "Since Lynsey's gone, and I won't be here, she'll be on her own. I don't .. I don't like that."

"I'm pretty sure Cheryl can handle herself, Brendan."

"Just ... Please." Brendan thumbed Ste's bottom lip. Finding the urge to steal another kiss difficult to resist. "Please."

"Okay." Ste agreed. "Okay."

The moment felt like it could last forever. At least, that's how it felt to Ste. He wanted to stay like that. Stay with Brendan's arms now wrapped around his waist, holding him close, and his around Brendan's neck. It's strange how safe Ste felt with this man. This man who was capable of so much. Capable of so many bad things. He had the ability to hurt anybody. He could hurt the people he loved if he had too. Ste knew that all too well. But why was he thinking of this now? They were together. Brendan was about to go somewhere, god knows where, and it would be god knows how long until Ste saw him again. However something was stopping him from just letting Brendan have him there and then. Something in the back of his mind, telling him not to do it, not to get too involved, it'll be harder being without him if he did.

"You okay?" Brendan asked feeling uncomfortable by Ste's silence.

Ste hesitated before he spoke. Should he really say it? Should he really let Brendan in so easily? After everything ...

"I love you." Ste blurted out, looking straight into his eyes. Searching for nothing. Just wanting him to know. Before Brendan could even answer, Ste leaned up to kiss him again, only briefly. Brendan looked stunned by the admission. Ste found it funny, really. Like he had ever stopped. He touched Brendan's shoulder momentarily, and without a word, left the bedroom, and left the house.

The rain had stopped. The air was ice cold. Sharp against Ste's face. He began walking in the direction of his flat, hands tucked in his pockets for warmth. He felt his phone buzz, and took it out, reading the message.

'_Me too._

_BB_.'

Ste smiled to himself as he re-read the message over and over again. He didn't care what tomorrow would bring. How much everything would dawn on him. Brendan would be gone. Ste wouldn't see him for a while. But what mattered, really, was that nothing would change. Nothing could change. The message that consisted of two mere words proved that. Ste put his phone away, and smiled the whole way home. Maybe everything would be okay for once. Maybe.


End file.
